This idea is mostly for parents of elementary aged children but could be adapted for adults with a little imagination. How about a deck of cards that can be personalized to create their own stories? Basically you would have something like sets of 10-20 cards for each area of characters, places (setting), things or minor characters, problems and solutions. Have some ideas that they can start with like use their best friends (characters), favorite places for settings, favorite toys (things), cartoon characters (minor characters), etc.. Really it can be anything they want. The cards will be blank so they can write and draw on them. The cards can be color coded for the different areas. My son and I just use cut up blank index cards and put them in colored protective sleeves that you can buy at most retail stores.
Game: We shuffle and draw a couple of cards from the characters, one place card, two or three thing cards, one problem card, and one solution card. We then proceed to tell a story based on these. They can also practice on their own by writing instead of tell the story in a journal. The stories will always be new and exciting.
Additional: Have a deck made to tell scary stories of monsters, castles, pirates, campfire stories, mysteries, based on their favorite books, have a deck about time traveling, visting other planets, etc-- bkornele, Feb 16 2004 Happenstance story cards http://shop.store.y...ore/storycards.html [oxen crossing, Oct 17 2004, last modified Oct 21 2004] I like this a lot. Kids aren't given enough leeway to make up their own stories these days - most of the toys they play with are movie merchandising trinkets that come with a pre-existing story attached. Anything that helps them to make up their own stories gets much pastry from me.
"It was Dr. Suess, in the Parlour, with a flying broomstick. Aided by Oompaloompas..."-- lostdog, Feb 16 2004 Sort of a card-driven reverse version of Mad Libs. I like it.-- krelnik, Feb 16 2004 Delightful. What a wonderful way to understand how your child thinks as well as seed their thinking with positive images. With as mobile as society has become it's something that could work well while traveling also.-- no12pass, Feb 16 2004 wow [no12pass] I dont think the idea was meant to do all that. Good one [bkornele].-- nomadic_wonderer, Feb 17 2004 There's this company called Happenstance Storycards. The story is already there, and let me tell you, they suck. They advertise "over half a million different stories in one deck." Using 40 odd cards or so, (I don't know, we lost some) you learn right away what everything is. Gets boring in a few attempts, when you figure out that you really can't make anything interesting happen. Not a criticism, just a: lookout, don't do it like this. [link]-- oxen crossing, Feb 17 2004 “Let’s see, I’ve got Jinbish and po cards, a garage card and a custard card and a ball of string card. The problem card is removing dog poo and the solution card is a personal snow cloud balloon. OK then, once upon a time…”-- FarmerJohn, Feb 17 2004 Hmmmm, sure looks baked.-- krelnik, Feb 17 2004 "...and they baked happily ever after."-- FarmerJohn, Feb 18 2004 From [oxen crossing] link: //Story Cards are the size of regular playing cars. For up to 7 players.//
I thought this was intended to be a simple, educational, imaginative game for children. Your version seems to require a garage capable of storing 7 regular automobiles. I'm not sure I want to pay the property taxes. But that's an entirely different story. Or perhaps it's just Happenstance.-- jurist, Feb 18 2004 Yes they did make that mistake about the cars. You know since I have little boys I can not seem to come up with a theme for little girls besides barbies and house. I guess most of the other themes could be used for little girls too especially if they design the playing cards themselves.-- bkornele, Feb 18 2004 I remember someone proposing this in about 1992 (not here, obviously, because there was no "here" in 1992) but I don't know whether they ever baked it.-- pertinax, Feb 20 2018 random, halfbakery